VERGE Boston: Machine-to-machine’s affect on energy savings

I just had the pleasure of serving on a panel at GreenBiz Media’s VERGE Boston conference, which focused on the convergence of buildings, technology and transportation. The panel, called “The Trillion-Dollar M2M Opportunity,” was about the dramatic impact of machine-to-machine (M2M) technology on four industry segments: energy, transportation, the built environment and agriculture.

M2M technology, also known as the “industrial Internet” or the “Internet of Things,” is the term used to describe the application of information and communication technology to improve and automate almost any business process. In the built environment or real estate world, this technology is enabling us to pull data out of building automation systems and to run real-time analytics that enable us to fine-tune the performance of all building systems and equipment—and significantly reduce reduce energy consumption.

The analytics also enable us to tell when the performance of equipment is beginning to degrade and to correct small defects before a failure occurs, thus improving comfort and reliability. The Jones Lang LaSalle service that utilizes this technology is known as IntelliCommand. As discussed in the panel discussion, IntelliCommand consistently delivers 10% to 25% energy savings while also improving operational performance for our clients.

On a related note, The Carbon War Room recently released a white paper that further describes the exciting possibilities across all four industry segments and describes the M2M industry as a potential trillion-dollar industry. If you thought that the Internet changed the way that we do business, the industrial Internet is going to have an even more dramatic effect.